Don't do it, don't do it...

AH SHIT. They did it.
:(

Classical Carrots

While I'm the headspace for it, I finally checked a long-standing 'to-do' item off my list today and re-scored a couple of scenes for Jennifer Gilbert's film "Don't Sit On Your Brother". Earlier this year I did the film's sound and editing and put together a piece of music for the end credits. There were two other scenes that warranted music which used some production archive cues originally. The limited allowance fair use of these pieces decrees meant that the film couldn't be screened internationally without paying royalty fees, and so the best compromise was simply to create an entirely original soundtrack. For the opening sequence I've used a slightly-modified instrumental track from my eternally-in-progress fourth Struwwelpeter album. It has a sort of 1950s big-band flavour that fits quite well with the era of the film. Another sequence is set during dinner, and for this I wrote a more classical type of piano piece. All dignified like, innit? Here's a clip of the latter scene:
I think the film works well for its target audience. As with Veronika's film, it's a very different type of story than I could come up with, so it was nice to get to be involved with them both. Let the brainwashing of our nation's children begin...

RAMming It Home

This week saw the completion of our group collaboration with the Royal Academy of Music. While we were all granted the clemency of an extended deadline, I found myself having to move to a new apartment during the project's final week, which made for a fairly hectic post-production process. With perseverance it came together in the end, and while there is still room for some tweaking before it is shown in June for a London screening at the RAM, it's a neat little film.Using Abbie Davies's illustrations to create a simulated paper cut-out set, I timed the animation and camera motion path to James Williamson's (of the RAM) score. While it is technically an abstract film, a narrative of sorts could be interpreted. The viewer becomes the film's main 'character', floating ethereally through a landscape that incrementally grows more and more frustrating as the search for an exit bears little fruit. The one other presence in the film is an occasional ball of light which entices the camera's POV to follow.To accompany James's score and give the minimalistic visuals a bit more atmosphere I created a soundscape to heighten the mood. Combining a variety of wind effects for the exterior forest sequence and a hollow, distant rumble for the interior 'doors' section, the end result hopefully contributed to the film's overall sense of unease. For the shots in which the mysterious beam of light appears I added some layers of long-wave radio static to give it a distinct presence when onscreen. What really sells the tone of the film is James's strings/percussion/vibraphone score itself, which intermittently punctuates the piece in emulation of a varying heart rate as the POV 'character's frustration mounts.On the whole I am satisfied with the outcome, and interestingly my personal issues with some of the sloppier camerawork weren't shared by others when the film was shown along with the other projects. There was some discussion however about the lighting for one section and the suggestion that we opted for an ending which provided further resolution. I think that to aquiesce the latter point would undermine our original intention to have the film come full circle. There may well be a better way of achieving that though. As I mentioned previously, the film will be part of a later screening in June, and so once time has passed it may be worth it to watch the film more objectively and determine what fine-tuning needs to be done if any.
Meanwhile here's a little clip to give you an idea of how it turned out:

Rotoscopic Glee! The Saga Begins...

NOTE: Your browser will need to be able to view animated GIFs for this entry to make sense.
One thing I've learned over the years is that I'm a glutton for punishment. This has manifested itself in a variety of ways throughout my life. Every academic project I've been assigned has been completed mere moments before the deadline after an entire sleepless night of coffee consumption, panic attacks and shameful weeping. Every girlfriend I've had seemed to share the same adorably infuriating set of psychoses and repressed hatred toward all men (with me as their singular representative). Every five days of healthy eating and consistent exercise is capped by a weekend of sloth and nacho consumption, which succesfully undoes any potential for self-improvement.
The list could go on, but I'd wind up writing a freakin' novel. The most recent example would be the sequence I am currently working on for my film. It is a POV shot in which the audience, through the eyes of the Hunter, chases the Duck around the cabin into a previously unseen trophy room. The sequence is briefly broken up by a side-view shot of the Duck avoiding buckshot as it flies past his head. The whole sequence lasts about fifteen seconds and is represented by these three storyboard panels:

To view the animatic and see the proposed scene in context, hop to this entry.

Piece of piss, right? Well, sure, there are many ways it could be, but that wouldn't sate the beast of self-loathing I apparently have working my controls.
To be fancy-dancy - and compensate for some inadequacy in my life I've yet to address consciously (I'm guessing 'Napoleon complex' as I don't even scrape 6') - I've decided to create a tracking shot using my 3D CGI set I constructed way back in March, print it out frame by frame and rotoscope the scene.
Rotoscoping is that somewhat 'cheaty' animation method where you essentially trace over action that has been created independently. Examples of this include Ralph Bakshi's hit-and-miss stab at 'Lord Of The Rings', the 'Lucy In The Sky...' sequence from 'Yellow Submarine', that Ah-Ha video and - fuck it - my one-minute film from the beginning of the year. These all relied on actual live-action footage, while the scene I'm currently slogging through uses this piece of simplistic computer animation as a reference:

To be a show-off, I've added a basic wallpaper texture which makes the rotoscoping process about a billion times longer, not to mention the wood panelling that appears after we round the corner. Because this line quality is way too smooth, by tracing over each frame in the shaky, thick-line style the rest of the film is in it should hopefully look impressive without sticking out too much. Here's how it looks at the moment with the first part done:

Now, this obviously needs colouring and clean-up, but I do like the way it's turned out. There's a nice 'boil' effect (where the lines sort of wiggle) which I've always enjoyed as a presence in the work of other animators such as Bill Plympton and Joanna Quinn. It keeps the rough look of the film without being so obtrusive as to wreck the shot, a fine line I've been treading since production on the film began. Without wishing to jinx myself, I would say that, as time passes, it's getting far easier to keep my balance in this respect. So coming up next, the full-colour version! Ah, this modern world of ours...

Story & Concept Art - Part Two, For True!

So we've previously established that our zombie-duck pal is a bit of a leech and a moocher, and has coerced the hunter into letting him stay for the night...

After an offer of one night turns into several weeks of scrounging, the hunter's patience wears thin. But this duck isn't going anywhere. You can't tell in this sketch because of the position of the wing, but would it be too disgusting and unpleasant to have the pizza he's just eaten be visible in his stomach wound? He is a zombie and I want him to be a little bit gross in a cute way, but I don't really want to make people throw up.

Personalities clash and the duck slowly starts to destroy the hunter's quality of life, through alienating his friends, constantly eating his food and, in this scene, stealing away his prospective lay. Bit of a smooth-talkin', Rico Suave mo'fo, this guy. For the hunter, it's the last straw.

Having had enough, the hunter chases the duck through the house, cornering him in the trophy room. Will he finish what he started all those months ago and kill the duck proper, or will our seemingly-doomed zombie friend smooth-talk his way out of it?

There is a final sketch for this first batch of concept art, which I won't include as it gives away my current ending. The reception these sketches have received so far have been positive on the whole, but my concern is whether I have the ability to maintain this style for a whole film's worth (by that I mean, like, 10-15 minutes). I don't doubt that a lack of fundamental artistic knowledge is evident with these drawings - the backgrounds are especially shaky and scribbled, while the characters don't really maintain much of a strict model. My plan over the next few weeks is to carry out some tests for what means of animation will best suit the visual look of the film. Whether or not traditional, 2D animation can carry it, or perhaps 3D CGI remains to be seen. Having seen its effectiveness on shows like Futurama, I'm quite interested in the idea of perhaps even marrying the two. One means can quite possibly cut corners of the other (for example, 3D CGI backgrounds with 2D character animation over the top, or perhaps the other way around) without jeopardising the film's aesthetic.